Hmmm... Break time, obviously

I've been so busy the past few months that I haven't really had time to have memorable dreams...

Honestly, I still can't really remember any recent dreams. There was one the other night about fires... it was more of a visual as I drifted off to sleep... the whole world was getting set on fire, one square inch at a time.

I tend to get frightening visuals like that right as I drift off to sleep... you know, like screaming babies or demonic faces or facial distortion or people's facial appendages getting hacked off with scissors... you know, the usual. Interestingly enough, as long I can stave off the initial terror, I can usually get right to sleep when I'm having one of those visual-dream-residual image things.

Something interesting I was reading this morning involves the spread of AIDS in Africa.

And it's funny to me just how persistent Mormon missionaries can be in trying to spread the word about their made-up doctrines. If you're in the mood for some irony, click here for an object lesson.

In other news, there may be a good reason to drive the speed limit... .Physiologically, humans aren't meant to drive fast in cars because our flicker fusion frequency isn't high enough. Compared to birds (> 100 Hz versus 60 Hz for humans), at high speeds, everything kinda blurs together for us, leaving us ill-equipped to react quickly (from kottke).

Bovine Growth Hormone in much of US Milk Supply

After Fox News suppressed a piece its own investigative journalist team did revealing involving Monsanto's Posilac (BGH) hormone product, a Florida appeals court rulesd that Fox (and the media in general) have no obligation to tell the truth - and, get this, can actually require their staff to line for them. Part 1 can be viewed here:

Part I

Part II

Minidreams

In my 5 hours of sleep last night, I had a few miniature dreams.

I dreamt that I was floating in zero-gravity while being a contestant on a gameshow. I kept floating upward at the exact moment I moved to hit the buzzer...but that wasn't happening to anyone else, so I lost, and some douchebag won.

I also had a tiny dream about being lost underground, in search of precious magical rubies that were rumored to cause eternal youth...I found one ruby, and was in the process of making my way back to the surface when the whole tunnel shifted, left-to-right, and I disappeared into thin air because I was confused and couldn't find my way back. Becoming air was advantageous, however, because I floated right to the surface and materialized, with the ruby in hand.

There was also one where I was swimming in a pond, with sunlight streaming down through the clouds...and something grabbed my ankle, pulling me under.

Dripping darkness

I found myself trapped underground, in a cold, damp, dripping tunnel of monstrous proportions. There was very little chance of my feet staying dry, as the floor of the tunnel was a flowing, brackish river of sorts. Tiny, perfectly round stepping-stones sprung up in the most arbitrary of places, making it a challenge to get anywhere. I had the distinct impression that the water below me was at least as deep as the ceiling was tall, and as the tunnel was at least 5 stories tall, I felt the cold hand of fear grip my heart every time I left one tiny step-stone to gain purchase on another...one false move would certainly plunge me into the depths of the murky waters.

There was a strange, sweet smell of cookies baking...delicious, tempting, and rather fleeting. My stomach began to growl, so I decided to follow my nose. However precarious my position might have been, I felt as though I hadn't eaten in days, weeks, and the scent of freshly-baked cookies served as quite the motivator.

As I ambled my fearful way toward the delectable fragrance, music began to play...eerie, delightful music...sad and haunting, but at the same time hopeful, wistful, reaching out for something greater (I really wish I could remember how it went...it's like nothing I've ever heard)...this melancholy tune ribboned its way around me, almost as though it were also in pursuit of the delicious phantom cookies.

The tempo quickened, and I found myself leaping over the water -- my heart in my throat with every flying leap -- balancing delicately on every small stone, miraculously still afloat in the tunnel. I began to smell the fragrance more strongly with every leap...the music became wild, dance-like (reminiscent of Paganini), and suddenly I saw a large, bejeweled door suspended in front of me in the air. I took a moment to gaze in wonder at the sapphires, emeralds, and amythests that served as an extravagant border to the large silver door...and then the music made as though it was knocking (think Beethoven's 5th), and the door swung open. I leapt inside, glancing about for the cookies, and heard the door swing shut behind me. I found a basket of cookies on a large wooden table and grabbed one, mouth watering.

I had scarcely taken a bite when I found myself lifted of the ground by monstrous hands...this was a giant's kitchen, and he swooped me up and ate me in one rank bite. I felt the searing pain of my ribcage being crushed, felt the foul-smelling darkness surrounding me, and then I woke up, sweating and fearful--and my back seriously hurt.

Orange dreams

Last night, I had a dream involving oranges...

I dreamt that I was living in a small village by the sea, and I had to sell oranges for a living. I traded my oranges to the fishmonger for fish, to the cheese lady for cheese, to the clothier for cloth, and so on. One of the oranges I kept for my own consumption (and I kept it because it was smaller than the others and not likely to be worth as much), and I saved it in my icebox to keep it cool.

One dark, stormy night I came home to my tiny cottage exhausted, hungry, and very sad (I think someone in the village had died, and I think I might have been returning from a funeral, as I was all dressed in black and I'd come from the local chapel). I didn't have much food left, so I got out my last little orange for a late supper.

As I was peeling back the thin layer of zest from the orange and placing them in a small wooden bowl, something small and round fell on the table with an audible "ping." Consumed with curiosity, I picked up the object, feeling the cold, hard, metallic bauble between my fingertips. I lit a candle to get a closer look, and seeing what I took to be smudges or tarnish, I pulled out my handkerchief and began polishing the object, trying to discover what was inscribed in the metal. My toil came to no avail, so I threw the bits of orange peel out the window, set the bauble aside in a chipped tea cup on the windowsill and went to bed.

In the morning, there was a distinct smell of oranges coming from my kitchen. I went in and looked in the teacup to check on the bauble...and I saw the tiniest little orange tree growing there! As the weeks passed, the tree grew very quickly, producing a dozen oranges in a day. I checked the first few oranges to see if they carried the same mysterious bauble, but they seemed to be normal, healthy oranges. I sold the rest of the crop at market and received a fine price for them.

This good fortune continued for several months, until I came home one afternoon to find the door to my humble cottage forced open, and my orange tree gone. I promptly fell into poverty, as I hadn't been keeping up my normal orange trees, and I found myself taking up residence in the local jail.

One night, a small metal object rolled into my cell, sprouted legs, and began conversing with me about the weather. The bauble casually mentioned that he would give me three wishes in exchange for my help. I wished myself out of the jail but found myself at the bottom of a well, where I had to dig and dig and dig but there would never be any way out...and the bauble was above me, cackling wickedly. I remember feeling very wretched and disheartened...and then my alarm went off. I was very happy to not be at the bottom of a well.

I'm hungry for oranges now.

Interrupted Dream-Imaginings

I dreamed last night that I lived in a tiny cabin. This cabin just happened to be in a jar, and the jar was filled with sea creatures that threatened to devour me if I didn't close the back door of the cabin tightly enough.

As if that weren't agitating enough, there was this guy who lived next door who was helping me write a song, and he wanted to hide a bearskin filled with gold in my back closet. So we hid it, and then he suggested that we open the backdoor to make sure his wife wasn't worried about him...and sure enough, when the door opened, she was walking with their little girl in her arms, and when she saw him with me, she was very upset. She ran over to the door, and along with her came some of the scary, hungry sea creatures...they started to slither in the room.

So the infidel decides to close the door, but instead of having balls enough to do it himself, he starts ordering me to close the door and bolt it tightly. It's a pretty complicated mechanism, and I'm not quite strong enough in the dream to make it work...and his wife is on the other side of the door, banging on it, which makes the bolt start to loosen and fall off the door, and mr. stupid keeps yelling at me to close the door...I just did what I could to close the door.

When the bolt finally fell off the door with a CLANK on the cabin's rustic hardwood floor, I had had just about enough of mr. whinypants, so I whipped the door open and said, "Talk to your wife, she's upset."

When his wife saw me, she handed their little girl to me and proceeded to beat the shit out of the infidel, yelling and cursing at him. Apparently she had known about the gold-filled bearskin and she wasn't very happy about his hiding it. I caught something about "passing the curse on to this innocent woman!" and figured the bearskin must be cursed. "Haha," I thought, "This whole island is cursed, we're stuck in a bottle with sea monsters, for god's sake!"

One of the scary sea creatures actually slithered up to the little girl and me and started hissing her a lullaby. It was very haunting music...like nothing I'd ever heard before. It's times like these that I wish I could record my dreams and catch the things I hear on paper.

I woke up without remembering how the dream ended...I don't think it really had time to end, it felt more like a snapshot of my unconscious.